|
Television screenwriter Cord Jefferson (USA, 1982) debuted in cinema with
American Fiction (2023),
based on
Percival Everett's
2001 novel "Erasure",
a satire (at times hilarious) of the intellectual establishment.
He employs moderate narrative tricks, like characters who speak to the author
and multiple endings for the movie, but mostly it's a straightforward style
and the real "trick" is in the way he makes fun of a society steeped into
obsolete stereotypes.
The subplots about the protagonist's ordinary life (the elderly mother, the
gay brother, the independent girlfriend) elevate the satire to a naturalist
drama: the whole grotesque story of the book is actually as real as
the various incidents of his family life. The satire is not satire: it is just
normal life. And the satire is the surface of an existential dilemma which
matches the dilemmas of what to do with an elderly mother, a gay brother and
an independent girlfriend. In fact, there is something about Monk's misanthropy
that makes him as "guilty" as the media world that gets escoriated: Monk
has a hard time dealing with the people around him, from the college students to his own brother. He never knew "secrets" about his father that everybody knews, as if he had been missing in action all the time. He has lived all his (single) life insulated from the real world and it is a shock for him to learn what people want to read and see, just like it is a shock to discover things about his parents his siblings. He lived in his own world and never paid attention to anybody and anything. The film is both the satire of a society that fails as a moral being
and the portrait of a man who failed as a social being.
Monk (Jeffrey Wright) is a misanthropic Black college professor who gets in trouble when he offends a White student by using the word "nigger". The board of the college decides to suspend him.
Another bad news comes from his literary agent: his new novel has been rejected by the publishers. Monk attends a conference and learns that the current
best-seller is written from a Black woman, Sintara, and is a shameless concentrate of stereotypes about Black people.
Monk returns to his hometown, where his ailing mother is being assisted
by a loyal housemaid, Lorraine, and his sister Lisa, a successful physician
who has been divorced for a while. There are obvious signs that their mother
is losing her mind.
Monk visits a bookstore and gets angry when he sees that his books have
placed on the shelf of "African-American Studies" although they have nothing to
do with such studies, just because he is a Black author.
Monk is angry in general that society keeps dwelling on the stereotypes of
the Black ghettos, a stereotype that doesn't apply to his family.
Lisa reveals that their father cheated on their mother, and hints that it may
be time to place their mother into a nursing home.
They also have a brother, Cliff, who is gay and does not help out taking care of the aging mother.
Lisa seems normal but suddenly she dies of a heart attack.
Their estranged brother, Cliff, a plastic surgeon, attends Lisa's funeral
Cliff is divorced after his wife caught him having sex with a man; he now engages in frequent drug use and casual sex
Monk meets and starts dating Coraline, a lawyer living across the street from his mother's beach house.
Cliff comes home for the funeral. We learn that their father killed himself.
One day Monk meets his mother's neighbor, Coraline, who is divorcing.
They immediately become good friends.
Monk is obsessed with Sintara's best-seller, which he considers garbage.
Out of spite, he sets out to write a similar stereotypical novel,
"My Pafology".
We see the characters materialize in front of him and discuss the plot and
the dialogue with him. He sends the novel to his agent who initially refuses
to accept it, being garbage from the literary point of view.
Monk doesn't even sign it with his real name but with a pseudonym.
Monk and Coraline start dating.
Surprisingly, a publisher loves "My Pafology" and offers a huge sum for it.
Monk initially doesn't want the deal, because the novel was written as a joke, but his agent convinces him that it's
good money. On the phone with the publisher's snobbish executive, the agent
comes up with the lie that the author is a fugitive convict.
Meanwhile, the local old sheriff starts dating old housemaid Lorraine.
One night Monk's mother wanders alone by the beach and Monk decides that it's
time to find a nursery home for her even if it will be expensive.
Meanwhile, a Hollywood producer has bought the rights to adapt the book.
Monk is reluctant again and remarks that the dumber he behaves the more people like him.
Meanwhile, an important academic institution asks Monk to sit on the jury for a literary prize for Black literature, and Sintara is one of the other judges. Monk
accepts because it's his chance to censure banal books about Black stereotypes.
Monk places his mother in a nursing home and continues his romance with Coraline, who is unaware of the new novel. Monk has a new condition for the publisher: he wants to change the title to "Fuck".
Monk has a turbulent relationship with his gay and drug-addicted brother.
The book comes out and it's an immediate best-seller. Monk gets interviewed
on TV shows, hiding behind a screen and speaking like a ghetto gangster.
The police starts investigating who this fugitive convict could be.
Ironically, his own girlfriend Coraline reads the book and likes it. This is the last straw: Monk gets furious that people like a book that was written as a joke.
This causes a rift between the two.
The jury has to pick a winner. "Fuck" is the favorite of the majority (all Whites). Only Monk and Sintara disagree. Sintara thinks that it's a book full of facile stereotypes, and Monk agrees because he knows that's exactly what it is.
Monk, however, confronts Sintara and asks her what is the difference between "Fuck" and her own best-seller, a question that offends her.
Monk attends the award ceremony. When the title of the winning book is announced, the announcer adds that the author cannot collect the prize because he is a wanted fugitive. but Monk starts walking towards the stage and tells the audience that he has a confession to make... At that point the movie cuts to a Hollywood
studio where the movie that we have been watching is being made.
The producer is discussing with Monk what the ending would be.
Monk would like a simple black screen, leaving the audience to guess what Monk's confession will be.
The producer doesn't like it. Monk thinks of another ending, but it's inadequate.
Finally Monk thinks of what could be a stereotypical ending for a Black movie:
the cops enter the venue, demand that the fugitive convict surrenders, Monk lifts the prize, the cops think it's a gun, the cops shoot Monk dead.
(Note: at the time there were several incidents of Black people shot dead by cops).
The producer loves this ending.
Monk walks out of the studio where his brother Cliff is waiting, and they drive away.
(Copyright © 2024 Piero Scaruffi | Terms of use )
|
